


i know, i know, i know

by evie_everyday



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: (merlin doesn't actually die btw), Canon Era, Defying Fate, Grief/Mourning, M/M, POV Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Post-Magic Reveal, and arthur refuses to let him, merlin dies at camlann instead of arthur, there's also a mysterious goddess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-31
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:08:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,179
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28462164
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/evie_everyday/pseuds/evie_everyday
Summary: He’s screaming, in anger and pain and grief as he reaches for Merlin, clutching his body in shaking arms. A king doesn’t cry, but a man does, and Arthur is a man with his entire world cradled in his lap.He begs Merlin not to leave him, clutching him in his arms and cursing every time he’d let his pride stop him from holding him when there was breath in his lungs.**One-shot in which Merlin is struck down at Camlann instead of Arthur, and Arthur refuses to let him die.
Relationships: Merlin/Arthur Pendragon (Merlin)
Comments: 10
Kudos: 277





	i know, i know, i know

**Author's Note:**

> It's been so long since I've posted anything, ahh! 
> 
> You guys have all been amazing. It blows me away that even though I haven't posted anything in almost six months I'm still getting kudos and comments on the things I have posted. I'm so sorry to anyone who read my multi-chapters and haven't gotten an update in forever! School and work have been crazy.
> 
> Buuuut, because tomorrow is the new year, I thought I'd post this little tidbit I've had hanging around for awhile. Hopefully I'll get some progress on my multi-chapters before the next semester starts, but no promises ;)
> 
> Title is from "I Know the End" by Phoebe Bridgers.

As soon as Merlin collapses, Arthur can’t breathe.

He’s never been one to believe a heart can literally be broken, no matter how often his father accused him of being a hopeless romantic, but right now, Arthur feels like his heart has been torn out of his chest, whatever’s left of it beating raggedly as he falls to the ground besides his closest friend.

A part of him is gone. It’s missing: he can feel the emptiness crawling through him like poison. 

He’s screaming, in anger and pain and grief as he reaches for Merlin, clutching his body in shaking arms. A king doesn’t cry, but a man does, and Arthur is a man with his entire world cradled in his lap.

He begs Merlin not to leave him, clutching him in his arms and cursing every time he’d let his pride stop him from holding him when there was breath in his lungs.

The dead Saxons around them, struck down by the power Arthur didn’t realize Merlin held until far too late, press around them, watching, listening, waiting. Arthur is lost in a sea of souls, and he is going to drown in them. He sees himself in their glassy eyes, gripping Merlin with desperate hands, searching for a heartbeat that isn’t there.

Arthur has never prayed before, never asked any gods for anything, but having Merlin in his arms pulls him to his knees.

_Please, let him come back to me. Please, have mercy. Have mercy. I can’t go on without him, please, please, let him come back to me._

He feels the presence of his knights at his back but doesn’t have the energy to feel ashamed by his cowardly display. He can’t feel anything past the wall of grief enclosing him and Merlin, Merlin who is everything.

_Please, don’t take him. It’s not his time, don’t take him. Don’t take him._

A sudden quietness descends over the battlefield, and for a moment, Arthur hopes the stillness is death that will bring him back to Merlin. But Merlin is still lifeless in his arms, and Arthur feels as dead as all the souls wandering the field in silent agony.

_Arthur Pendragon._

The voice is soft but booming at the same time, like it comes from the very depths of the earth. 

There is a woman before him, shining with an otherness that makes Arthur suddenly terrified. 

_Who are you?_ he asks, holding Merlin tight against him in case she is Death and has come to take him away.

She ignores his question.

_It is difficult to defy destiny, Arthur Pendragon. It is impossible to change the course of fate_.

She looks at Merlin with such a piercing gaze that Arthur wants to shield him from it.

_But Emrys has never allowed such things to stop him, has he?_

Arthur has only known of Merlin’s gifts for minutes, but it is no trouble to believe he is as much an arse to fate as he is to Arthur.

_You were supposed to die today, Arthur Pendragon. But Emrys’ love for you changed the course of fate._

She crouches by Merlin, putting a hand on his injured chest and the air she inhabits is left feeling empty.

_What is it like to love?_ the woman asks.

He opens his mouth to answer, but no sound comes out. The emptiness inside him gives way to pain, pain like he has never felt, until the wall he has built around himself and Merlin crumbles and the pain is threatening to pour onto the earth around him. The soil will be washed away in his grief and fill the world with heartbreak until it rises past his lowered head, rising, rising, rising, until he is drowned in the overflow of his sorrow.

He says nothing, but the woman’s expression changes.

_It is an agony. It is having your heart ripped out again and again._

When the smooth corners of the woman’s mouth turn down, it is like she has never done so before. Arthur wishes he could take her naivety as his own, cast the burning grief into her emptiness.

_But it’s also the greatest joy in the world._

For the first time the woman sounds unsure, and Arthur finds his eyes meeting hers once again. He sees it is not uncertainty but emotion that makes her voice waver as tears spill over her cheeks. They seem heavy as they fall to the earth.

_It is knowing that no matter what your destiny, you will bear it side by side with another._

Arthur says nothing again, but the woman stands as if he’s answered. She smiles. If it wasn’t so terrifyingly hollow, she might have been beautiful. Arthur feels like he can breathe once more.

_So devoted,_ she murmurs, her damp eyes drifting over the stories written in bodies crumpled on the battlefield. _The stories written for them forget how powerful their love can become._

_I would like to see more of this story,_ she says to the sky, and Arthur watches strands of her hair fall to frame her face as she leans over the two of them. She presses her palm to Merlin’s chest and plucks a piece of bloodstained grass from the ground by Arthur’s bent knees. She holds it in front of her like it is sacred. The wind is swift to carry it away when she opens her eyes and palm together.

_For your love, Arthur Pendragon, I will do this._

For a moment, the world stops, and once again, Arthur wonders if he has slipped into Death. The woman is no longer with them, but neither is anyone else. It is Merlin and Arthur, as it has always been.

But Merlin’s eyes remain closed, and his heart remains defeated.

The world resumes around them, the clatter of armor and stench of blood and aching of Arthur’s muscles only a prelude to the symphony of his returning grief.

He pulls Merlin tighter to him, unwilling to press on yet. He hears Gwaine tell the others to piss off, Leon give them some vague orders tinged with the adrenaline of winning and the sadness of the loss required to do so, and for a moment, Arthur believes with desperate sincerity that he will never be able to get up from this battlefield.

He nearly laughs at the memory of himself telling Merlin no man was worth his tears. The foolhardiness of someone who did not know what it meant to love. The stupidity of someone who did not know themselves.

His tears wane as the sun falls and the moon rises, and after an eternity, he is able to exhale.

He releases the tightness of his hold on his friend, smiling as he sees Merlin’s face, the stillness that would have once morphed into sympathy and support and urged Arthur to continue on.

But before he stands, he feels Merlin’s lungs expand under his protective arms. The moon reflects off the blue of his irises as his eyes flutter open, and Arthur’s heart is intact once again.


End file.
